Improvement in connecting sheet metal for eaves-troughs



' each sheet are folded back,

UNITED STATES PATENT .Orrrcno WILLIAM M. PHELIS, OF MARSHALL, MICHIGAN.

IMPRoVrMENT IN CONNECTING SHEET METAL FOR EAvEs-TROUGHS.

Specification forming part oi Letters Patent N0. 36,855, dated November 4, 1862; antcdated June 13, 1862. l

To aZZ whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, `WILLI/tivi M. Pnnnrs, of the city ot' Marshall, county of Calhoun, and State of Michigan, have invented a new and Improved Mode of Constructing Eaves- Troughs of Sheet Tin or other Metal; and I do hereby declare that the following is a full, clear, and exact description of the saine,

reference being had to the annexed drawings, making a part of this specification, in which- Figure l is a perspective view of asection of trough in alinished state; Fig. 2, aperspective View exhibiting the mode of connecting the sheets. Fig. 3 is an end view showing the man- `ner of preparing the sheets before shaping.

ceed to describe it.

The proper number and size of sheets of tin to form anyr given length or proportion of trough having been selected, a slight notch is made in two opposite sides of each sheeet (see A A) at a distance from one end to leave sufticient surface to form the bead7 B, for the purpose of stiffening the edge, and which is common to all troughs with concave bottoms; The sheets are now taken to the folding-ma chine,77 and by it the two notched edges of as seen at a a., eX- cepting at that portion reserved to form the bead, which is left flat, and now projects over the folded edges, asatbb. The sheets are now -ready for turning the beads, which is done in the ordinary way, by placing the edge of the sheet in a narrow slit or groove made in a round rod of the proper size, which is hung in bearings and turned by a crank until the bead is formed, when the rod is drawn out and the sheet liberated. The sheets, with their edges folded and beads turned, are now placed in a proper position side by side on a long flat bench, and are connected together sheet by sheet in the following manner: The operator holding a sheet at or about a right angle to the adjacent one, as may be seen at Fig. 2, is enabled very readily to slide one bead within the other telescopically, as at e, (C representing the sheet lying on the bench, and D that to be connected with :it,) until the folded edges overlap, when the sheet D is turned down and drawn back until the folds lock into each other, when they are hammered down tight. 'Ihehammer ing, however, is not done until all the sheets are so connected, and care must be taken that the bead`(which in this'position projects below the upper side of the bench) is kept in close contact with the edge of the said bench along its" wh ole length, in order that the bead for1ning the `edge of the gutter may be perfectly straight and true. The seams, after being well hammeredin the position just described, are now soldered in the usual way by drawing the iron from the raw edge along the lock seam E toward the bead, and around its lap seam e, when the whole is. ready1 for turning the gutter, which completes the operation. The gutter is turned by a round wooden roller rof proper` diameter and of any convenient length, which, commencing at one end, the operator places on the upper side of the sheet close to and parallel with the bead, and, grasp'- ing the bead and roller with bothhands, he bends the connected sheet upward by degrees, gradually shifting the roller along until the whole assumes a proper and even degree of curvature.

Should the trough to be made be of such a length that it would be inconvenient to construct it one length, it 'is then madein convenient lengths and 1i nished, as previously described, with the exception of bending the gut ter, andthe sheets, transported in that state to the building, locked, lapped, and soldered together and fastened to the roof, when the gut ter is bent by a hand-roller, as heretofore de scribed.

The difference between my mode of constructing such troughs and that in common use is, that mine consists in connecting the scparate sheets together before the gutter is bent, either in one continuouslength, orn sections, to be afterward put together on the roof, and in so connecting them by a compound lock-andlap joint that it is utterly impossible for the expansion and consequent buckling of the 'metal occasioned by' change of temperature The mode of uniting the separate sheets of metal of which eaves troughs are composed by the use of the locked seam E, in combination with the lapped seam e, of a stiiieningbead, B, substantially as and for the purposes specified.

' WILLIAM M. PHELPs.

Witnesses:

E. H. LAWRENCE, S. J. BURPEE. 

